


Horsing Around

by Prinzenhasserin



Category: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: Family, Fanart, Gen, Horses, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-19
Updated: 2016-06-19
Packaged: 2018-07-11 11:05:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7046908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prinzenhasserin/pseuds/Prinzenhasserin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a widely recognized fact that Eugenides is terrible at horses. It's among the things he despises, actually, just like sword fighting and the court.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Horsing Around

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aslightasthistledown](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aslightasthistledown/gifts).



> Dear aslightasthistledown,  
> it was a delight working on your prompts. It's all my fault not writing a longer story, because I was busy researching if the Greeks had saddles during byzantine times, and what breeds of horses they had, and which measurement system to use, and what the fashion regarding soldiers on horses were, only to disregard them because they either didn't fit canon, or the story. Despite all that, I had a tremendous amount of fun, and I hope you had too.  
> I'm fulfilling this as the horse prompt, but it does have plenty of cameos from Gen's family, and I hope it's at least a bit like how you imagined it?
> 
> This is Gen's backstory, and fits after the short story "Thief!" into the timeline. I could not find when exactly Gen's grandfather died canonically, so he's here in this. 
> 
> Thank you so much, [pendrecarc](http://archiveofourown.org/users/pendrecarc) for moderating this gift exchange.  
> This has been beta-ed by [lebateleur](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Lebateleur) and [bookwyrm](http://archiveofourown.org/users/bookwyrm) who were a tremendous help and without which this story would be as awkward as this sentence. Thank you, very much obliged.

As soon as Aunt Livia started nagging again, Eugenides had escaped to the only place nobody would follow — the palace roof overlooking the courtyard. The only access involved climbing across the wall past a kitchen window. One of the cooks had the bad habit of throwing organic waste out of the window into the chicken coop, and terrible aim besides. Therefore, the way up was not only hard on his joints, but also terrible for the nose, and pretty disgusting during the heat of summer.

Aunt Livia seemed to believe for some unfathomable reason her opinion mattered to Gen, or any eleven-year-old boy. She judged his horsemanship to be very poorly, his hair too unkempt by far, and professed the belief after enough discipline he might get to be a passable soldier. Gen was to be married soon, preferably to her daughter. If not Hedite, she seemed to be willing to settle for Breia. Gen was electing to disregard the priest who had allowed contemplation of both these unions: Hedite was Livia’s daughter, which should disqualify her automatically, and Breia had to be _at least_ related to a harpy.

The roof had looked like the best option, after the conversation turned towards his terrible habit of reading, not to mention that pesky practice of dedicating other people’s property to the gods — he knew he should not have looked so intently at her new lace shawl. It would have looked terribly well as a doily on the Thief’s altar.

Aunt Livia didn’t know anything at all about how the world worked, and even if he was talented at sword work, plenty of other people were, too — that didn’t mean he had to use his talents. Nobody was telling Stenides to marry his cousins!

The palace roof was covered with polychrome tiles. They were steep and slightly uneven and demanded full concentration to traverse. His mother used to call it "Thieves’ fall," but that wasn’t funny anymore. It looked pretty, and was devoid of nagging aunts, so it was still better than anywhere else.

Gen picked his way across wary, but with ease; the absolute last thing he wanted was to be splattered across the courtyard in tiny pieces. He leaned against the dormer and sighed. As he crouched down, he almost overbalanced a moment later, when his grandfather laughed right into his ear.

Surprised, Gen turned around and almost faltered on the tiles. On the very top of the ridge stood his grandfather, fearless of falling. 

"I heard you got into trouble with your aunt," he said, and Gen’s heart sank.

"She got into trouble with me," Gen corrected. "Horses are boring anyway. I don’t like them." He had dislocated his shoulder escaping the horse paddock his cousins had locked him in at night once when he was younger and more gullible. It had been Breia’s idea, probably. Maybe he shouldn’t have called her ugly where everybody could hear it.

"Ah, yes," his grandfather said, lightly. "I heard you shouting about that." Instead of saying anything more, his grandfather came down to join him on the relative safety of the lower roof.

Gen stared at the sky. Funny how not saying anything at all could make him feel unreasonably stubborn. 

It was going to be dark soon, and the warmth of the setting sun tickled his face. Gen took a deep breath — the air tasted slightly dusty. "Agathia is going to be home for midsummer, right? Maybe she could teach me." That was a compromise with which he might not entirely lose. His sister would not make him join the soldiers.

The Thief sat down next to his grandchild, and flicked a finger against his ear.

"You are starting to gain a reputation, Eugenides." It was unusual that his grandfather would use his full name, but it meant his suspicion that there was more to this than immediately apparent was true. 

"Either you play to it — your fear of horses — or you don’t. It’s your decision. But you should think about what people are going to think or use against you when you are the Thief of Eddis. The thing about the Thief, child, is that he never is just a thief. He can also be a roof top dancer, or a jeweller, or a soldier, or nothing at all, just a librarian occasionally in the service of the crown. Think bigger. Don’t take these things lying down. Do you want to take part in the court squabbles? Then do. But if you don’t—"

The Thief of Eddis was so _old_. Gen watched in awe as he stood up again, and then danced across the roof, in precise steps, with the fluidity of a dancer. His grandfather opened his arms in a grand gesture, and said, "The sky is the limit, Gen. Let your imagination run wild."

Gen looked up, and the sky turned purple, and orange, and blue — the world seemed to hold in place, as if a silent doom of fate hung upon him. 

"And as a thief, I might need to ride horses," he concluded. "I might need people to think I can’t, too."

"Smart kid," his grandfather said. "But it’s not that you‘d need to. Would it be easier to use horses occasionally? Would you benefit from learning to ride? Could it be useful to be thought of as incompetent on horseback? Would you want to expose a weakness?"

Sometimes, the cryptic nonsense his grandfather spouted was upsetting. Sometimes it was inspiring.

"What people know about you has consequences. What people know about you doesn’t need to be true. And sometimes, you can use the truth to perpetuate a lie," Gen said to sum up, and then grinned. Nobody would know what was coming for them.

With the encroaching dusk, the courtyard had turned quiet — it was summer after all, and very late. As the Thief of Eddis wound down, and Gen had to sit on his thoughts, there were shouts getting louder from the distance.

"Ahh," his grandfather sighed, "they are finally back."

A company of soldiers on horseback rushed into the courtyard, easily spotted from the roof top, between them a rather large horse. 

Gen knew that horse — as much as he knew any horse. It had been a gift from the King of Sounis. A stallion of exalted lineage; and, to hear the court talk, a rather poor attempt at assassinating Eddis. The horses of Eddis weren’t bred for speed and power like this one was — due to the mountains and the harsh winters the horses of Eddis needed to be hardy and robust. The horses of Sounis were delicate, and started tripping over themselves with just a single stone in their path.

This stallion had escaped by tearing down the paddock fence with a well-aimed kick, thrown the Minister of War over the six-foot wall encasing the paddock just this afternoon, and then run wild until an entire squad had herded it back to the stable. Right now, he looked massive even from thirty feet away, between the four soldiers on horseback trying to reign him in. Appropriately, he was called Fovera, or maybe that’s just what they were calling him now, since it was an excellent description of what he was — a menace.

Fovera wasn’t coming quietly.

He was big for a horse, too big for comfort said some — and lots of people had an opinion about the King of Sounis first courting gift to the ascending heiress. Gen (and Helen) thought it ridiculous. Every muscle in the horse’s body looked to be straining against the leathers—nobody down there _wanted_ to hurt him, and yet.

Hooves clacked on cobblestone, but he was still fighting like the wings ofPeriphys were behind him.

"That one," his grandfather told him quietly, "you may skip horse-training, if you can get onto a saddle with that one."

Most of his grandfather's demands were supposed to teach him important things. He was not learning this lesson, not even if it killed him.

❖

He tried with his sister Agathia, first. Gen already thought lessons with his sister were not going to end well, but she would be offended if he didn’t at least ask. His sister was a passable rider, lengths better than Gen himself, but she could not understand why he was so very badly about horses."You have so much in common with a mule, Gen," she complained. "Why are you so bad at riding?"

He had someone else in mind for a teacher, anyway. His alternate option would be hell on his pride, but so was getting yelled at by his sister.

❖

Breia was instantly suspicious when Cousin Eugenides — "My name is Gen, you’d better use it!"— sidled up to her, and asked her about horses during the celebration of some cousin’s name day.  


She and Gen were currently feuding, and she did not use that word loosely. Gen was her nemesis, her arch enemy. He had been her whole life, since he had been born exactly ten days before her, and also had the audacity to be born a boy. He was also exactly one place removed from her on the order of succession, even though the minister of war removed himself from the succession when marrying the Queen Thief.

Usually it was very frustrating to be his enemy, because Gen was brilliant when he wasn’t reticent, and stubborn as a rock, but adversity built character, or anyway that was what her mother told her.

He also did not understand interpersonal relationships very well, and the only place she was winning was among the people of the court, and she was going to stretch her victory as long as she possibly could. Soon, their cousins would grow up and stop beating him for not holding his smart mouth. He was already the better sneak,with more than his fair share of blackmail material. Inevitably , someday he would swoop in there, too, and take away the prestige and accolades she had worked so hard for. Then again, she would be expected to marry soon, and since there was nobody of marriageable age between the throne and her, her husband was going to be a foreign diplomat. Maybe someone more interesting, because she was angling for a place at a university.

"You do know about horses, right?" the object of her contemplation repeated.

"Yes," she said warily, because this was unlike Gen’s usual tricks. He never took the straight path if he could tie himself and everyone around him in knots instead. "What do you want to know?"

"I _need_ you to teach me about horses," said Gen, and she knew her expression reflected surprise. She got her face under control quickly. 

"What!?" she whispered in furious incredulity.

"You owe me," Gen said, very much too loudly for her comfort. "I never told anyone about—"

Hastily, before he could say anything else, she grabbed him by his sleeve. "This really isn’t the place to discuss favours," she told him condescendingly and looked around, twitching slightly.

"It’s not a favour since you owe me," he said. "More like— compensation for damages suffered."

He was back at a normal volume, but Gen was usually not the type for open confrontation. Because they ended badly for him, and after all, she was a girl. Inclined to the delicate things, and crying.

"I need someone to teach me about horses, and you need someone to take care of your suitors," he repeated, tone brusque, and then added spitefully, "I have no idea why you have so many, you harpy."

Breia knew exactly why she had so many suitors, and it started with her position in court, which was elevated enough to be interesting, yet not to the point of intimidation, and ended with her pretty face. If Gen’s head wasn’t so far up his own ass he couldn’t see anything but shit, he would know so himself. 

Valiantly, she refrained from commenting, and instead gave him a sharp look. Breia didn't think her resistance to her parents' wedding plans was common knowledge, so how did Gen notice? "I want my suitors' gifts to vanish mysteriously. I want them embarrassed in front of court in ways that aren't connected to me. If you can do that, I will teach you about horses.” She tried to keep pleasure out of her voice. Having his help in this was worth a great deal. She'd seen him handle their cousins, after all. 

Eugenides gave her a long, unreadable look. She took a breath to retract the offer, but he spoke first. “Deal. Let's meet behind the stables at dusk.” He was all the way across the ballroom before she could remind him that the courtyard was a popular lovers' walk where she empathically did not want to be seen with Gen.

"What was that all about?" cousin Hegite asked. She had prowled over within seconds after Gen had left.

"Oh, that!" Breia laughed airily, "My favorite earrings were on the Thief's altar last week. I told him what would happen next time."

Hegite tittered, and the conversation moved to Agape’s upcoming performance on the harp.

The pile of courting gifts on her dressing table was gone when she got back to her room. She smiled to herself as they reappeared, one after another, in the safety of the temple. 

Gen could be very useful, after all.

❖

Despite their general antagonism, Gen had to admit Breia was an excellent horse person, noted for her skilled dressage and particularly daring jumps. She would also understand the need to keep their association quiet, and out of the rumour mill — which she controlled to a large degree. Maybe she could also invent some spectacular failures on his part, should his grandfather go back on his word. The Thief probably had not anticipated that Gen would take the obnoxious choice.

Horses were terrifying creatures, and nothing could convince him otherwise. Gen himself wasn’t sure if mounting Fovera for half an hour, or taking at least half a year of riding classes was the better choice. To console himself, he compared it to ripping off bandages. 

Breia was the right person to ask about horses, despite all of his misgivings.

"Do not confuse your horse," she told him. "They’re basically very skittish people. If they can’t see you, they get nervous. If you panic, they get nervous. If there is something new at all, they get nervous. If they get too nervous, they die." She gave him a look. "Do not make them die."

Gen did not trust Breia to tell him the important bits, and so he researched. Apparently, horses were pretty delicate creatures, and anything from small stones in their hooves to food poisoning could kill them, in addition to all the ailments humans could die from. Gen had known not to trust them.

Breia made him stay next to the horses in the stable for a few nights, and then, she made him groom them. He had to brush horses for endless hours, and then comb their tails, and then, because he needed to learn horses, she made him bridle, and cinch, and saddle, and snaffle horses, until he finally learned those were real things and legal to do.

❖

"Alright," Gen told his grandfather when he knew every muscle in a horse’s body and how to prevent them from overstretching, "I’m ready. I will never survive riding lessons, but with a bit of luck, I’ll survive half an hour and that damned horse."

The Thief looked astonished, and then agreed with visible hesitation, "If that’s what you are going to do."

"I am," Gen replied, and shifted his pitch slightly lower to fake his confidence more convincingly. "I’m ready."

❖

The riding corral next to the stables was a central location, and had a lot of foot traffic — and so a lot of people stopped by to gawk at the fool that was about to try to get on Fovera’s back. More than a few of them held grudges against Gen, too.

The fool himself appeared entirely calm, now that he had something to prove. It was an excellent day for riding; the blazing sun was tempered by fluffy white clouds, and a fresh breeze cleared the air of the smell of manure and horse sweat.

With almost anticlimactic ease Gen tightened the girth (he’d been watching unlucky riders for the past weeks who hadn’t checked their saddles)and used the fence to pull himself onto Fovera’s back.

He sat awkwardly — he had never sat on a horse before and it was strange, but he was on top of the horse more than one seasoned soldier had sworn never even to touch, and he was still alive for the moment.

"Half an hour more on his back!" a bystander shouted. He was hushed immediately, but the damage was already done. Fovera startled, and began picking up speed.

"Sit your goddamn arse down!" Breia shouted, before she could help herself. She was not supposed to know what was going on — she hoped it looked like she was passing by and had only stopped for the opportunity to mock her least favourite cousin.

She wasn't about to keep shouting helpful and uncharacteristic advice, but maybe he heard the first time,because he did, indeed, buckle down. His seat was not very good, and Breia laughed at her cousin jolting about on top of Fovera's rough gait. She regretted that she didn't have her drawing book with her, but the memory would keep until she got back to her rooms. 

She had tutored him after all. He’d better stay on.

After a while, the horse tired himself out, going merry in rounds; and then, the half hour was over, and Gen was still on top. He looked more uncomfortable now, cramped and tensed, not unlike a sack of roots.

A benevolent murmur went through the spectators, and someone shouted, "You can come down now, Gen."

Said person turned, grimaced, and then said drily, "I don’t think I can, actually."

Breia closed her eyes, thought very fondly, _Idiot_ , and called out, "Falling is the easy part."

The silence was abrupt and absolute.

She had not made friends with mean comments about the Queen’s Thief. There were some mistakes one had to stand for, and Gen knew (probably) how to take it.

He laughed, and then jumped down, into the waiting arms of his god. 

❖

His grandfather never bothered him with horse riding lessons again. His father, likely because of trepidation for what Gen would do to get out of it, did the same. Aunt Livia decided that passive aggressiveness would be the way to go, but she had not counted on his bullheadedness. 

Gen would have celebrated his own genius were it not for—

"Get on that horse," Breia said. "You need to know at least enough horse riding to fake your abilities if they get scrutinized."

_Breia was a conniving inbred little shit_ , Gen thought. She knew intimately that he did not like horses, and yet, here he was. Learning to ride horses.

"Stop sulking," she ordered him, and manoeuvred her horse next to his.

Gen gave her the slow flutter of eyelashes and the Who-Me look the order that deserved.

"You need to be on horseback for the coronation of your precious Eddis," Breia said. "Don’t be such a wimp. Sit straighter. Elbows at your side."

That was how Gen learned to pretend to ride well, by riding well. 

❖

When Breia stopped annoying him with forceful invitations for outings on horseback because she had to go to university and "learn the arts and find a husband," Gen cheered. 

He would not hear from her again for five years, until after he had stolen Attolia, elevating his status miles above his prospects in the past. 

She sent a dissertation by someone named Turin the Younger — Breia’s father was the only Turin he knew — about the Earth revolving around the sun, which was revolutionary to be sure, but he was much more embarrassed by the second gift.

It was a painting almost the size of a mural — a rendition of him on Fovera, who had come with him from Eddisas a wedding present. The menace behaved as stubborn and obstinately as ever, and rumour among the stable hands had it the horse could not be ridden at all, and was an unbroken stallion, or a badly failed assassination attempt. 

In Breia’s painting, Fovera the menace was clearly recognisable as such, and Eugenides was recognisable as his rider — maybe all the more so because he was falling off.

Attolia took one look at it, and then watched him as he grew redder and redder. "A terrible horseman," she said finally, with a sardonic twist of her mouth.

"Really terrible," Eugenides replied, "so terrible. You would be embarrassed by looking."

Attolia ordered the painting hung in the receiving rooms, where while keeping it relatively private she could look at it every day.

* * *

 

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> Some meta points:  
> Nestor (the name of Eddis Helen's pony in the short story Eddis) means "homecoming" in ancient greek  
> Fovera (greek for menace) is a female name. So is Skyla (sort of: shithead, stupid bitch) which was another great contender. Considering there have been famous horses called Orange Peel, Seldom Seen and Authentic, I am in excellent company.  
> The horses of Sounis are modelled after the modern sport horse (I was specifically thinking about Arabians, or maybe Lipizzians -- which I of course decided after drawing the fall -.-), but the Eddisians like their horses with an ambling gait, like the Europeans during the middle ages for travelling. This is because I have a hard time imagining them keeping a large cavalry in what appears to be quite large mountains with harsh winters.


End file.
